It was a very hard row to hoe for me to get sober. Very, very hard. I barely made it. It took everything I had to get and stay sober. Many times I almost lost this precious sobriety I hold so dear. Having alcoholism is horrible. It’s a horrible condition. It stunted my emotional and mental growth because of the way I metabolized it, I can only say this from the inside, I do not know what it’s like to be a non-alcoholic, but this is what I believe as an alcoholic.

I believe that it was my physiological body that was my downfall. I believe I was born with alcoholism. My first drunk was as a four years old when I was told I drained all the left over wine glasses from the Thanksgiving table and came into the living room drunk out of my gourd. Everyone laughed. They thought it was so funny.

I believe that, as an alcoholic, the way I metabolize booze in my body is unique. For me this is also true of sugar and white flour. It helped me sidestep the stresses that were necessary for my emotional growth from a child into an adult by removing these stresses from my body and mind, making them ‘disappear’ and putting me into instant la-la-land. Every time I drank it this effect happened instantly, so naturally I drank it as often as I could get my hands on it. When I wasn’t drinking it I was eating sugar/white flour. After all, who wants stress when you can get instant relief from it? Therefore on the outside I was physically growing up but on the inside I was staying a mentally and emotionally stunted child. I became what to all intensive purposes was a circus freak. A child mind in a grown-up body. Suddenly I found myself thrust into a grown-up world. And, here I was, face to face with the harsh realities of a grown-up world for which, as a stunted child, I was totally unprepared to cope.

This world of gown-ups demanded that I produce like a grown-up. No one could see me for the child I was inside. Meanwhile the way my body metabolized the booze was such that it continued to take the stress off of all this mess and to help me ‘feel better’ (de-stress) in regards to what was happening around me. More and more, the stresses kept piling up. First there was the day-to-day stresses that I’d evaded learning how to cope with but that wouldn’t go away no matter how hard I tried to evade them. Then there were the past stresses of the messes I’d created from my lack of coping skills and exacerbated by drunkenness. Then there were the future stresses that scared me half-to-death because the booze (sugar/white flour) had kept me from learning how to handle ‘future thinking’. On top of that there was the pain from childhood abuse that I was never able to properly process because the booze kept me from doing that correctly. All I could do with that was cry drunken tears for myself. And drunken tears never help process pain. Everyone I knew was either mad at me or didn’t want me around because I’d never learned out how to cope with people or with life. I knew I was a total failure at all of it and my self worth was in the gutter.

Meanwhile there was always the booze. Ahhhh the booze, and it’s allure.

I couldn’t stay away from it’s allure. I knew it would take all this horrible stress off my shoulders. It was so easy. It kept pressuring me;

“I will help you. I will help you. I will make you feel better and get you away from all this mess. Come to me and I can make it all go away for you…..”

But it’s promises always came up empty. The next morning reality would come back with a vengeance. More problems to deal with… even more stress to cope with. But then, after the waters calmed down there it was again, calling… always calling, pressuring me…. “I will help you…” Then I had to sober up to face hard, hard, reality again. Even the booze itself — my friend — played an evil part in adding to all the stress. Every time I ‘came to’ there it was… REALITY… right in my face again. Each time it became worse… and worse. More and more horrible. But then there was the booze again. The alluring booze that kept fooling me into thinking it was going to take the stress away but only added to it. Calling me. Pressuring me. Telling me this time it would really work! A merry-go-round of the macabre.

And it all started because of the way my body metabolized booze. It’s physiological and it’s horrible. I don’t think non-alcoholics metabolize booze the way alcoholics do. It doesn’t give them instant relief. I think they still must face life stress and grow up the way they’re supposed to grow up even if they drink alcohol or eat sugar/white flour during the process. I don’t think reality disappears when they drink booze or eat sugar/white flour the way it did when I drank or ate it. So they grow up and learn how to cope with life the way grown-ups are supposed to do.

When I got sober I had to learn life’s in’s-and-out’s and go through the whirling and stressful growing pains that children must endure to become normal adults while, at the same time, being a physical adult, I had to keep up with what life required of me in a grown-up world. It’s hard to go through growing pains as a youth but it’s murderous to have to do it in an old grown body. And even, 36 years later, it still is some times. Now I mostly don’t eat sugar or white flour and must grow up even more during that process.

This is not to excuse alcoholics for their behavior. It’s just a description of what it was like for me as one.

I copied this from a the website: HERE. (It comes with a neat video too). I stumbled onto this myself a while ago and it really does work. Please copy and spread it around if you will. If we all get together and do it, it could really make a difference with road rage.

Don’t try this in the fast lane. For some reason it makes drivers crazy when you try to do this in the fast lane. He was doing it in the fast lane in the video but I think that was only because it was an exit lane.

Once upon a time there was a train. On this train were many passengers coming and going about their business. Some were reading their newspapers; some where furtively ‘people watching’; some where just looking out the windows at the scenery passing by.

As you can already tell… when I wrote the post “What is it with you people?!!!“ I was in quite a snit. Let me explain.

Like innocent animals who would never hurt a flea, children are close to my heart. They have no rights of their own and can hurt no one. But we hurt them plenty without thinking a thing about it. We want to give birth to them when we want. We use them to gratify us and many times we don’t think that what we are doing by creating them is doing them a great injustice. They are born to go on to suffer lives of desperation and that’s just not fair to them. They grow up to become adults. They grow up to become painful… us.

Well I’ve been free of flour/sugar products for 1½ years and cigarettes for 1 year and I haven’t lost any weight at all. It’s been very discouraging to say the least but I think the tide is finally turning regarding the weight.

For most of my sober time I have not really been able to identify with the Steps as AA has laid them out. As a Bipolar person with ton’s of PTSD, here is how using the Steps makes sense to me today. I don’t apply then to drinking anymore as 34 years of recovery from alcohol has pretty taken this off the table. Now I have the ‘left-overs’ from the drinking to deal with… my ugly, messed up feelings that make life so hard for me.

I just realized something about myself. I love, love, love being outdoors. Just being out of the house.

We recently had a huge deck put in on the back of the house. It’s the full length of the house and 12 feet wide and it has a lattice cover on it with a railing all around. It’s as big as two big rooms. I put a six-chair black wrought iron table out on it; a double rocker and a nine-foot hammock. I’m out there everyday for hours at a time… just swinging in my hammock with my two little doggies.

I’m just loving it!!

Now I finally know why. It’s because nothing bad happened to me when I was outside. All the abuse and horror happened…

inside the house!!!

Is there anybody else out there in blog-world
who has this same sensation?

People have been asking me for this story again. I have combined the two posts so they can be read together.

One Friday morning in 2009, my life was drastically changed. The week before had been filled with Jack-in-the Box moments. These are moments where life jumps out at you and scares you silly. I never did like that toy and can’t even imagine working at a factory that makes them. The song it plays – “Pop Goes the Weasel”- warns you that Jack is about to pop out so you try to prepare yourself for his sudden appearance. Being prepared doesn’t help. I always jump. That Friday morning I was weary from jumping.

On Monday we were a family of four; by Friday we were down to three. On Monday I was a minister’s wife; by Friday he had been fired. On Monday, we were upper middle class; by…

I don’t expect anyone to read this. I’m having a terrible time expressing myself lately. My writing has gone to shit for some reason and I don’t know why. But I’m going to take a stab at it anyway. This post is about what life’s been like for me and what I’ve made of it so far.

Jesus wants us to be without pretense when we come to him in prayer. Instead, we often try to be something we aren’t. We begin by concentrating on God, but almost immediately our minds wander off in a dozen different directions. The problems of the day push out our well-intentioned resolve to be spiritual. We give ourselves a spiritual kick in the pants and try again, but life crowds out prayer. We know that prayer isn’t supposed to be like this, so we give up in despair. We might as well get something done.

What’s the problem? We’re trying to be spiritual, to get it right. We know we don’t need to clean up our act in order to become a Christian, but when it comes to praying, we forget that. We, like adults, try to fix ourselves up. In contrast, Jesus wants us to come to him like little children, just as we are.

Come Messy

The difficulty of coming just as we are is that we are messy. And prayer makes it worse. When we slow down to pray, we are immediately confronted with how unspiritual we are, with how difficult it is to concentrate on God. We don’t know how bad we are until we try to be good. Nothing exposes our selfishness and spiritual powerlessness like prayer.

In contrast, little children never get frozen by their selfishness. Like the disciples, they come just as they are, totally self-absorbed. They seldom get it right. As parents or friends, we know all that. In fact, we are delighted (most of the time!) to find out what is on their little hearts. We don’t scold them for being self-absorbed or fearful.

That is just who they are.

God cheers when we come to him with our wobbling, unsteady prayers. Jesus does not say, “Come to me, all you who have learned how to concentrate in prayer, whose minds no longer wander, and I will give you rest.” No, Jesus opens his arms to his needy children and says, “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28). The criteria for coming to Jesus is weariness. Come overwhelmed with life. Come with your wandering mind. Come messy.

What does it feel like to be weary? You have trouble concentrating. The problems of the day are like claws in your brain. You feel pummeled by life. What does heavy-laden feel like? Same thing. You have so many problems you don’t even know where to start. You can’t do life on your own anymore. Jesus wants you to come to him that way!

Your weariness drives you to him.

Don’t try to get the prayer right; just tell God where you are and what’s on your mind. That’s what little children do. They come as they are, runny noses and all. Like the disciples, they just say what is on their minds. We shouldn’t try to fix ourselves up, but when it comes to praying we completely forget that. We’ll sing the old gospel hymn, “Just as I Am,” but when it comes to praying, we don’t come just as we are. We try, like adults, to fix ourselves up.

Private, personal prayer is one of the last great bastions of legalism. In order to pray like a child, you might need to unlearn the non-personal, non-real praying that you’ve been taught.

The only way to come to God is by taking off any spiritual mask. The real you has to meet the real God. He is a person. So, instead of being frozen by your self-preoccupation, talk with God about your worries. Tell him where you are weary. If you don’t begin with where you are, then where you are will sneak in the back door.

Your mind will wander to where you are weary. We are often so busy and overwhelmed that when we slow down to pray, we don’t know where our hearts are. We don’t know what troubles us. So, oddly enough, we might have to worry before we pray. Then our prayers will make sense. They will be about our real lives.

Your heart could be, and often is, askew. That’s okay. You have to begin with what is real. Jesus didn’t come for the righteous. He came for sinners. All of us qualify. The very things we try to get rid of—our weariness, our distractedness, our messiness—are what get us in the front door! That’s how the gospel works. That’s how prayer works.

In bringing your real self to Jesus, you give him the opportunity to work on the real you, and you will slowly change. The kingdom will come. You’ll end up less selfish.

The kingdom comes when Jesus becomes king of your life. But it has to be your life. You can’t create a kingdom that doesn’t exist, where you try to be better than you really are. Jesus calls that hypocrisy— putting on a mask to cover the real you.

Ironically, many attempts to teach people to pray encourage the creation of a split personality. You’re taught to “do it right.” Instead of the real, messy you meeting God, you try to re-create yourself by becoming spiritual.

No wonder prayer is so unsatisfying.

So instead of being paralyzed by who you are, begin with who you are. That’s how the gospel works. God begins with you. It’s a little scary because you are messed up.

Become like the little children Jesus surrounded himself with. The disciples often behaved like little children. For instance, what does Peter do with whatever is on his mind? He blurts it out. That’s what children do. When Nathaniel first hears about Jesus, he says the first thing that comes to his mind: “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” (John 1:46). It is the pure, uncensored Nathaniel. When Jesus greets Nathaniel, you can almost see Jesus smiling when he says, “Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no deceit!” (1:47). Jesus ignores the fact that Nathaniel has judged Jesus’ entire family and friends in Nazareth. He simply enjoys that Nathaniel is real, without guile, a man who doesn’t pretend. Jesus seems to miss the sin and see a person.

I have a Christian friend that I’ve been working with who practices lay counseling. The other day when I stopped by her house, I noticed that she was putting her counseling money loose on a book shelf, so I decided to get her a nice wooden box for her to put her money in. Continue reading →

For all the beauty of the Christmas season, it can be a difficult time for survivors of emotional child abuse. Whether the adult is estranged from toxic parents or still in contact, the adult often must battle feelings of sorrow, frustration, anger, and loss.

At the Invisible Scar, we recognize all those valid feelings… but we also hope to give some ideas for creating new (and realistic) expectations for this special time of year. These tips will not offer any miracle cure for the very real pain of survivors of emotional child abuse—but I hope these ideas will bring comfort and joy to those who want to, despite all the past abuse, live good, healthy lives no longer dominated by the past. The scars are real, the pain is real… but there is beauty to be found in a new present, in a new beginning.

Lately I’ve been having a tough time with my junk food abstinence. I’ve been going to see a therapist about it for a month or so. During our last session she came up with a pretty good idea about what was wrong with me. She said…

I want to write my story because I’m sure there are people out there who are caught by the title, and who cope with deep depression to the point of wanting to commit suicide as I once did. The desire to be gone from here hacked at me up to the age of 43. Then, one fateful day….. thanks be to God…..

Before I go any further, I want to say that I think that all women should FIRST talk to someone who has had a difficult time after going through an abortion, BEFORE deciding on this option to deal with a pregnancy. Not all women suffer from going through it, but some women, after they abort, find themselves dealing with tremendous amounts of guilt. This may, or my not, apply to you.

My husband’s therapist did this for me. This is not my own invention.
She also did this for my husband who was suffering deep guilt as well.

* * *

I was asked, by my husband’s therapist, if I would be willing to try something that might help me recover from an abortion I had in 1989. After nine months of horrible excruciating guilt, I was ready to try anything.

I'm Michelle. This is my blog. I write about women and fatness, expound upon semi-coherent thoughts I have in the middle of the night, and offer tough love to those in whom I am disappointed; they are legion.